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TAMPA, Fla. (NewsNation) — In a recent settlement, Disney has agreed to a $10 million payout to address claims that it breached federal child privacy regulations on YouTube, the Department of Justice revealed on Tuesday.
According to the DOJ, Disney Worldwide Services and Disney Entertainment Operations failed to categorize certain YouTube content as “Made for Kids.” This oversight allegedly enabled the platform to gather data from young viewers without obtaining consent from their parents.
The order finalizes a settlement reached in September, which allowed Disney to avoid a trial for the alleged violations.
The $10 million agreement also requires Disney to create a program to “ensure it properly complies” with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule privacy law on YouTube.
That means Disney must properly label videos as children’s content, ask parents’ permission for data collection and notify guardians of what has been collected.
Disney’s YouTube channel is “extremely popular” and has garnered billions of views in just the U.S., according to the DOJ.
“The Justice Department is firmly devoted to ensuring parents have a say in how their children’s information is collected and used,” DOJ Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate said in a statement.
